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Has the Jefferson statehood movement stalled?

That was the narrative coming off this series of votes, which saw a union-backed opposition defeat the referendum in Del Norte County, even though the one in Tehama County passed.

The Shasta County supervisors voted down a Jefferson proposal last month too, but according to this letter in the Redding Record-Searchlight, the room wasn’t happy about it:

I went to the Shasta County Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday morning and was very disappointed. The room was standing room only with supporters in favor of the State of Jefferson. Those in favor outnumbered opponents 7-to-1. The supervisors who voted against supporting the State of Jefferson movement said they haven’t seen any proof that such a state would be economically viable. How do you explain in three minutes something as complicated as dividing a state into two separate states?

This Tuesday, Sutter County’s board of supervisors is expected to adopt a resolution in support of Jefferson secession:

Interesting discussion was held by the Sutter Supervisors on Tuesday, July 8th, who all stated their frustration with the State of California and said they support the 51st State of Jefferson project. But the supervisors decided to write their own resolution regarding withdrawal from the state. So it will be during their July 22nd Board meeting, when they will finalize a resolution with a vote.

Each board member told the room packed with State of Jefferson advocates on Tuesday they supported withdrawal of North State counties from the rest of California.

So, no, it doesn’t really look like things have stalled at all.

Most of the local but not locally-owned papers will probably continue pushing the narrative that the movement is losing steam, though. The official position of the Scripps paper in Redding is that we don’t want to give another state to those nasty Republicans, and who would want to live in “Idaho. With beaches.” And the Medford Mail-Tribune just across the border in Oregon, owned by the Local Media Group, keepswondering why southern Oregon has been pretty quiet so far. Sue Gallagher, a Democratic Party official in Tehama, has been waging a one-womanletter-writingcampaign in the local papers against secession.

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3 comments

ILIVE IN shasta and i can tell you the bos does not represent the people here ,they are more for the illusion of representation then actually representing the people. shasta county will pass the state of jefferson but only when the movement actually puts it on the ballot

There is a solution. Puerto Rico is inching closer to statehood. Puerto Ricans traditionally vote Democratic. The fear, of course is that the country will get another blue state. American states have historically entered the Union in twos. Before the Civil War, states were always added in twos. One state being a free state and the other a slave state. Kansas was suppose to be a slave state to balance the admission of the free state of Oregon. But just before statehood, a vote was taken and the Kansas populace changed their minds and Kansas was permitted to enter the union as a free state. A few months later, South Carolina exited the Union. The simple balancing act was thrown off kilter. More recently, Hawaii started petitioning for statehood in the 1930’s. World War 2 tabled the momentum. After the war, the statehood movement resumed. It was very obvious that the island state would go blue. To balance that, Congress moved in on Alaska, a territory that was far from ready for statehood but its people would definitely vote red. So Congress pushed. A Tennessee Plan vote was taken in the northern territory and statehood won. Congress allowed Alaska to enter the union before Hawaii to guarantee that balance would be maintained. So if the blue state of Puerto Rico enters the union, Congress would be looking for the red balancer. Enter Jefferson.